Follow the rainbow. Farrar wins sprint in Tirreno-Adriatico.

You’re Garmin-Cervelo sprinter Tyler Farrar and you get to pick anyone in the world to lead you out besides Mark Cavendish. Hmmm….

Why not follow the wheel of the current world road race champion and teammate Thor Hushovd? That might work pretty well, huh?

In fact, it worked well and very, very fast in stage two of Tirreno-Adriatico. Farrar won easily, beating Alessandro “legal limbo” Petacchi (Lampre-ISD) and Juan José Haedo (Saxo Bank-SunGard). Score another for the battling buddhist from Wenatchee, Washington.

Speaking of Cavendish, he was dropped on the climb of the Poggio alla Croce, fought his way back, then lost his lead-out man Renshaw in the finale. This beard thing may be bad luck for the Manxman. It’s nine days until Milan-San Remo: plenty of time to shave.

The 202 kilometer stage from Carrara to Indicatore was a sprinters stage on paper and in person. While Team Sky threw together a train for Edvald Boasson Hagen, the Norwegian could manage no better than eighth. Nobody at Sky is using that silly “Eddy Junior” tag they stuck on Boasson Hagen last season.

Argyle Genius Jonathan Vaughters did his race summary on twitter: “A big thank you to Thor Hushovd. The God of lightning struck down his enemies with the wrath of the bolt!”